Conference Update – August 26, 2012

We’re well underway with all of the preparations. We’ve got our keynote speaker, Patti Callahan Henry. Our faculty members, including some of SCWW’s own, promise to bring us great lessons and ideas for our writing life. There will be sessions on pitching, platform, marketing, poetry, YA and query letters among many others. And don’t forget about the always popular Slushfests! It’s a great chance to hear editors and agents talk about what they see when they get a new manuscript submission.

Our volunteers are hard at work, especially our Silent Auction committee, a big thank you to Claire Ianinni for all of her efforts so far. It’s going to be a great event and we hope you’ll be as excited as we are about what’s being offered.

We are also out visiting local chapters to talk about the conference. I spent some time this past week with the Chapin-Irmo chapter. Another volunteer is going to speak at the Aiken Whiskey Road chapter and I’ll be visiting with Columbia II soon. If you are interested in having someone come to your chapter to talk about the conference, please send me an email (scwwveep@gmail.com) and we’ll get it set up as soon as possible. We won’t take much of your time and we’ll try to answer any questions you might have.

I enjoyed meeting some of the members in Chapin. I got a chance to hear some of their concerns and answer many of their questions about SCWW as well as the conference. SCWW belongs to all of us and it will take all of us to make it everything we know it can be.

In all that we are doing, we are led most ably by Ginny Padgett, who wears multiple hats for SCWW this year. She is the president of our organization, our publicity chair as well as our conference chair. I don’t know when she sleeps, but she’s always on top of things and I feel like a slacker when I hear how much she’s been doing. Take a few minutes when you have time and send Ginny an email (scwwpresident@gmail.com) to say thanks for all she does to keep SCWW’s finances in the black and on the path to another successful year.